Fear is an emotion indispensable for survival

It's hard to evoke emotions in a video game, be they sadness, humor, anger... or fear. For years, we've gone to the same places to get our gaming horror fix, but by now we basically know what to expect from Resident Evil and Silent Hill. That's part of the reason why it has been easy to get excited about Dead Space, the new science-fiction horror game from EA. Yes, it's a new IP. Yes, it's from EA, And yes, it's very, very good.

Dead Space is a gothic, and oddly beautiful, thriller

This is an odd thing to say, considering that the ground being covered here is hardly new. There is a mining vessel called the USG Ishimura, it's in deep space, and it has gone dark. It's a planet-cracker, able to take entire worlds apart and mine their component parts. A small team is sent to check in on the Ishimura, and guess what? Things go very bad very quickly. It turns out the crew of the ship was dealing with much more than minerals. Mix ancient artifacts with science and religion and you have... well, you have the "plot" for Doom. But I digress...

Dead Space isn't afraid of wearing its influences on its sleeve, and while there are no overt homages, you can tell that Glen Schofield and the rest of the Dead Space team love the science fiction and horror classics. This is part Alien, part Doom, part Resident Evil, with a dash of Event Horizon. In terms of inspiration, there are worse places they could have gone.

The question is, why should you care? We've seen concepts like this before, and the gaming world isn't hard up for monsters in deep space. One of the impressive things about Dead Space is how effortless the team makes the game look; it feels like a group of friends got together over a few beers one night and decided to create the type of horror game they've always wanted to play. While much of Dead Space may be familiar, it's a game that takes all the best parts of the genre and makes them better, while avoiding almost every pit similar titles fall into.

You have much to fear from the shadows

I had a chance to travel to San Francisco to meet the team behind the game and explore the process that went into creating Dead Space, so I know that nothing about the game was effortless. This was one of EA's most focus-tested games, and the team described multiple times that developers butted heads with gamers over ease of use vs. the ability to go for the scares. The time they put in paid off, and luckily the team seems to have had almost complete freedom to chase its vision.

This is a game that makes you want to pop some popcorn, turn down the lights, and dig in for hours at a time. Let's take a look at what makes Dead Space so special.